May 18, 2006
Learning from flies and worms: Genome Sciencs Symposium will consider ‘model’ organisms
Some of the world’s leading researchers working with the genetics of model organisms, such as yeast, roundworms, fruit flies, fish and mice, will be at the UW next week to take part in the 5th annual daylong Genome Sciences Symposium. The theme is “Insights from Model Organisms.”
The symposium begins at 10 a.m., Wednesday, May 24, in Hogness Auditorium at the Health Sciences Center. Everyone is welcome and registration is not required.
“Each year, we choose a theme according to what we see as the top areas of interest or excitement,” said Dr. Celeste Berg, associate professor of genome sciences and a symposium organizer.
Interest in model organisms has grown tremendously in recent years, in large part because of work showing just how similar the genetic controls for many of the essential processes of life are, from yeast cells through humans.
Dr. Lee Hartwell, now president and executive director of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center and a faculty member in Genome Sciences, was an early advocate of working with yeast to understand how cell cycles are controlled — work for which he won the Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine.
In addition, Berg noted, as a result of the Human Genome Project and related sequencing efforts, complete genome sequences are now available for the most commonly used models, revealing a surprising number of genes that have been conserved, or kept, through evolution. These models help us understand how these genes work in all organisms.
“The speakers we invited are all leaders in their fields,” Berg said, “and they all have a perspective on how much we have been able to learn from these model organisms. They are also strong speakers who can explain the connections to people not working in the same area.”
Speakers include:
- Dr. Barry Ganetzky of the University of Wisconsin-Madison,
- Dr. Michael Marr of the University of California at Berkeley,
- Dr. Pamela Silver of Harvard,
- Dr. H. Robert Horvitz of Massachusetts Institute of Technology,
- Dr. Barbara Meyer of the University of California at Berkeley,
- Dr. Simon John of the Jackson Laboratory, and
- Dr. Gail Martin of the University of California at San Francisco.
For the full schedule of presentations, including titles, see the Web site at http://www.gs.washington.edu/news/symposium06/index.htm.
